European monitors who have overseen the first Palestinian-controlled border terminal for the past seven months warn of unspecified "consequences" if Hamas officials don't stop smuggling millions of dollars into the territory. Yesterday, the Gaza Strip's main international gateway was closed after the European monitors said an Israeli security alert prevented them from manning the crossing, officials said. The Palestinian militant group Hamas said it suspected the Rafah crossing with Egypt was closed to send a message to its government to stop carrying cash by hand into Gaza to sidestep a Western aid embargo. The monitors brushed aside the accusation. The Palestinian Authority has resorted to carrying millions of dollars in cash across the border from Egypt because Middle Eastern banks, fearing U.S. sanctions, have refused to transfer funds to the Hamas-led government. Most of the money represents donations from Arab and Muslim countries. ... http://www.washingtontimes.com

In the second botched Israeli airstrike in Gaza in two days, two people were killed and 13 were wounded when a missile hit a house Wednesday, just hours after grieving and angry Palestinians buried three children killed in a previous attack. Militants vowed revenge, and Israelis debated the effectiveness of airstrikes that target militants but are taking a mounting toll on innocent Palestinians. Israel's air force commander said Thursday the army stands firm behind its policies, but must "make a great effort to try everything possible to avoid hitting civilians." "We have to fight terrorism and we are doing it," Maj. Gen. Eliezer Shakedi told Israel's Army Radio. "This is more or less the central alternative, the most accurate and the best possible alternative without entering a broad and very significant (ground) operation." ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2105374

Republicans, defending an unpopular war in Iraq, will use two Senate votes today to exploit Democrats' divisions on the conflict in an effort to cast them as weak on terrorism and national security. The Republican-controlled Senate is expected to defeat two competing Democratic measures to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq that Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee described as a strategy of ``cut and run.'' The proposals -- one calling for full withdrawal of U.S. troops by July 1, 2007, and an alternative that has no timetable -- have split Democrats and imperil the party's ability to transform growing public discontent with the war into a winning issue in the November elections, analysts said. ``It has hurt Democrats to be divided on this issue,'' said Michael Dimock, associate director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press in Washington. ``The image of the party is one that is lacking a clear idea about how to handle Iraq.'' ...http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=a0axf_Aygp50&refer=home

Al-Qaeda's No. 2 leader has issued a new videotape calling on Afghans to rise up against U.S. led forces in Afghanistan in the wake of rioting last month in Kabul. The video by Ayman al-Zawahri which would be his sixth this year was reported Wed by IntelCenter, an Alexandria, Va. based contractor that provides counterterrorism intelligence services to the U.S. government. "I am calling upon the Muslims in Kabul in particular and in all Afghanistan in general and for the sake of God to stand up in an honest stand in the face of the infidel forces that are invading Muslim lands," al-Zawahri said in Arabic, according to a translation by IntelCenter. The 3 1/2-minute tape appears to have been made the day after a May 29 accident in which a U.S. military truck crashed into traffic in Kabul, killing up to five people. The incident sparked anti-foreigner riots in Kabul that left about 20 people dead the deadliest unrest in the Afghan capital since the fall of the Taliban in 2001 ...http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-06-22-zawahri-video_x.htm?csp=34

The Red Cross has admitted Israel to the worldwide humanitarian organization early Thursday, ending decades of exclusion linked to the Jewish state's refusal to accept the traditional cross symbol.The approval came in the early hours Thursday following a two-day International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent.With a round of applause the Red Cross federation admitted Israel's Magen David Adom society simultaneously with the Palestine Red Crescent. An optional new emblem was adopted so that Israel could retain its red star of David instead of having to adopt the red cross or crescent used by the 184 other societies in the global movement....http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/06/22/israel.redcross.ap/index.html?section=cnn_world

Indonesian rescuers scoured mud-filled homes for bodies and some survivors suffered diarrhoea and skin diseases after landslides and floods on eastern Sulawesi island killed 210 people, officials said on Thursday.A search-and-rescue operation has been underway in South Sulawesi province after two days of heavy rain at the beginning of the week, but officials said some areas were inaccessible because roads and bridges had been damaged. Another 104 people were missing in Sinjai regency, the worst-hit area after flooding early on Tuesday that turned swathes of land into vast lakes. The Indonesian military, police and civilian search and rescue teams have been scouring the affected areas trying to recover bodies and digging into mud from landslides or left behind by the floods to look for survivors. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2105385